With the new season kicking off on August 16, we look at how sustainable the Premier League is and what is being done to work towards Net Zero targets.
Earlier this year, the Premier League revealed its Environmental Sustainability Commitment, which introduces a minimum standard of action on environmental issues across the clubs and the League.
The commitment includes
This is a good start – but considering it’s taken them nearly three years to publish this statement (which doesn’t cover domestic flight use), it’s not exactly headline news.
However, several independent bodies have assessed the Premier League’s sustainability and found some impressive results.
Global Sustainable Sport compiled a report of the 20 teams playing Premier League football during the 2023/24 season. Here are some of the key takeaways:
Sport Positive Leagues have been looking at Premier League sustainability data for five years, with founder Claire Poole telling BBC Sport that they’d seen impressive results.
Poole said: “Clubs are now much more frequently engaging on this topic – 16 Premier League clubs now have a sustainability page on their website; six clubs have Net Zero carbon targets; and first-team players more regularly appear in club videos recycling, driving electric vehicles and eating plant-based food.
“The new report enables clubs, fans, journalists and anyone in the sports ecosystem to easily find information relating to top-flight English football clubs and, while there is much work still to do, the progress from clubs over the past five years since Sport Positive Leagues started collating this information in 2019 has markedly improved.”
The main takeaway seems to be that the clubs are leading the sustainability challenge, with the Premier League promising to have data sets and initiatives in place over the next few seasons.
One of the most significant sustainability challenges facing the Premier League is the vast number of fans who travel across the country – and even globally – to support their teams in person. These travel-related emissions fall under Scope 3 and pose a considerable challenge for clubs to measure and track. Scope 3 emissions are a monumental undertaking, accounting for a large percentage of a club’s total carbon footprint.
Factor in stadiums like Old Trafford, which can host millions of fans over a season, and the task becomes even more daunting. Implementing effective sustainable travel policies and initiatives can have a big impact, enabling clubs to better understand and reduce their Scope 3 footprint.
However, clubs don’t have to face this challenge alone. Axiom specialises in tracking, recording, measuring and analysing Scope 3 data. Our sustainability software provides comprehensive solutions by calculating and analysing Scope 3 emissions, mapping your supply chain, and simplifying the entire reporting process.
Axiom sustainability reporting software has been built to help organisations cut their carbon emissions, achieve net zero quickly and accelerate their sustainability performance.
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